OXYCONTIN BLAMED FOR 8 DEATHS

C.B. Police Review 18-Month Period That Saw 20 Sudden Deaths

SYDNEY - Eight of the past 20 sudden deaths in the Cape Breton Regional
Municipality are linked to the highly addictive painkiller OxyContin, this
newspaper has learned.

Associate Chief Dave Wilson of Cape Breton Regional Police told this
newspaper that a review of case files over the past 18 months reveals many
of the sudden-death victims in 2003 abused prescription or illicit drugs,
or mixed prescription drugs with booze.

"Among those (20) deaths, one was morphine, one was cocaine, eight
(remains) were verified as having OxyContin," Associate Chief Wilson said.

"In one of these (deaths), there was 15 different drugs in one individual .
. . including aspirin, Tylenol 3, Valium, Ritalin, OxyContin and others.

"It's not just Oxy," he said. "There's a number of other prescription drugs
that are being abused."

One powerful drug is morphine, which can be lethal if not taken as
prescribed. Only two area physicians are licensed to prescribe the drug in
the area, yet it's commonly found on the street.

"Oxy is a serious concern to us, but the other drugs are, too . . . You've
got people in the community selling morphine pills, and there's a lot of
people taking that, too."

The force has received only one toxicology report from the lab so far from
the 10 sudden deaths this year. That report showed the cause of death to be
a lethal mixture of booze and multiple prescription drugs.

In one of those recent deaths, police on the scene found narcotic
painkillers Demerol and morphine, he said.

In another case, a young man died after taking morphine pills in the
afternoon, then shooting cocaine, and using OxyContin that night.

Associate Chief Wilson said if the province continues to ignore the need to
better regulate the prescription drug trade, death rates will increase each
year.

"We haven't had a death in the past 10 to 14 days, so that's good," he
said, adding later, "We need a better monitoring system."

The province's monitoring system relies on pharmacies to report drugs sold
within three weeks of sale, but doctors who are writing prescriptions have
no immediate means of checking on patients who may be faking illness or
seeing more than one doctor to get pills for the underground market.

Stolen pills are also moved and sold on the streets.

But the sudden-death toll in 2003 pales in comparison to the previous
year's figures.

According to autopsy reports obtained by this newspaper, more than 30
people across Cape Breton Island died in 2002 with booze, prescription
drugs and/or illicit drugs in their systems.

Some of those deaths were deemed accidental or deliberate suicides. Others
involved motor vehicle crashes, falls and even obesity.

Only two sudden deaths were related to OxyContin.

An autopsy of a 38-year-old man who died in North Sydney in November showed
he ultimately died from alcohol poisoning and possible hypothermia after
passing out in a car parked in his yard. His report showed the presence of
multiple prescription drugs, including OxyContin, as well as cocaine and
marijuana.

A Glace Bay man was found dead in his Brookside Street home in January with
OxyContin in his blood. The 26-year-old, who had a history of drug abuse,
died after using the painkiller, plus marijuana, methadone and other
prescription drugs.

Among the other deaths in 2002 in which drugs or alcohol were found to be
factors:

A 42-year-old Margaree Valley man who shot himself in August was impaired
by alcohol and drugs.

A 32-year-old Indian Brook woman died in a fire in March, but she had
almost four times the legal limit of alcohol in her blood, plus marijuana
and multiple prescription painkillers.

A 46-year-old man in Sydney fell to his death in March after he consumed
three times the legal limit of booze, plus marijuana and prescription drugs.

One in every 200 Cape Bretoners was prescribed OxyContin in 2002, three
times the rate in other areas of the province. In 2003, there were almost a
half-million pills prescribed, up just slightly from the previous year.

The drug is linked to hundreds of deaths in the United States, where it was
first introduced in the 1990s.